


heartsick

by its_nochillforov



Category: Voltron: Legendary Defender
Genre: Cuban Lance (Voltron), Homesick Lance (Voltron), Homesickness, Introspection, POV Alternating, does it count as a happy ending if it doesnt exactly have an ending, it's pretty sad amigos
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-10-26
Updated: 2017-10-26
Packaged: 2019-01-23 09:54:43
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,010
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12504736
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/its_nochillforov/pseuds/its_nochillforov
Summary: Lance, and the family he left behind, and the family he didn't know he gained.





	heartsick

 

**lance (before)**

 

Artificial light can only do so much. At some point, it becomes a searing presence behind your retinas, in a way that you know the sun never did.

It’s so horribly dark in space.

Lance has a window to his lonesome. There is a ledge beneath it, a sort of alcove where he likes to take his blue paladin blanket and swaddle himself until he can’t remember how cold he feels.

He’s been slipping off to his window a lot more, lately.

The stars, extending into eternity and the darkest corners of the universe to Lance’s eyes, greet him every time. There is no daylight in space. That took some getting used to.

When he was in the Garrison, it was no secret that he loved the stars. Who were you, if you were training to be a pilot and didn’t feel the same wanderlust? Every single pilot in the program had it burned into their very bones.

But Lance - he would sneak up onto the rooftop more often than not, after he discovered he could. And the nights where he lost himself staring into the depths of the night sky, when the only thing that grounded him was the cold concrete against his back -- 

He knew he would open his eyes one day to find himself among the same stars.

He just hadn’t realized how lonely it becomes.

Lance McClain was born in Cuba, raised in California, and is currently living on an Altean castle-ship floating in the Elsyian Quadrant, some two point five million light-years from the solar system. He flies a sentient robotic cat, and wishes he could tell his mami about it because his mami did love cats.

(This is what homesickness is.)

He makes sure to keep away from the glass of the window. Actually, it’s not even glass. He’s not sure what it is. Translucent, sure, but it has a different feel - it feels like the brassy metal of the doorknob on his sister’s door, the one whose lock was always broken.

Or like the metal of the oven handle, when his mami would say  _ Lancito, las galletas - _ and he feels how warm the heat of the oven would be, the fresh scent of them -

The air changes. It’s slight, but the rustle of fabric interrupts his meticulous study of the stars.

He doesn’t look up.

They settle down on the other side of the ledge, mirroring his pose with their back against the wall and their knees propped to their chest.

“You’re thinking too hard.” 

Keith’s voice is hardly a rasp, as if from disuse. 

Lance shakes his head slightly. “Mm. Don’t try it. You might hurt yourself.”

There isn’t a tease to his voice, and Keith doesn’t rise to it. Instead, he follows Lance’s gaze out, towards the endless sprawl of space and the darkness that it’s made of.

“Tell me.”

Lance takes a moment to process the words. His gaze flicks to Keith’s, just to read him - but Keith’s eyes are firmly fixed elsewhere. His jaw is set tight.

“Tell you what?”

“Tell me about your family.”

Keith could have said  _ anything _ else, anything at all -

“Mamá works as a journalist,” he finds himself replying anyway, “She loved - loves to write. Always smells like coffee, too. If I ever went to get a drink of water in the middle of the night, I knew she’d be on the couch with her laptop.”

Keith hums. 

“And mami’s a teacher at the elementary school. She loves it. I went to see her at work once, and her entire class knew who I was, just from the photos on her desk.”

Lance pauses. It’s different, to say it out loud. Like he’s spreading himself wide open for Keith to see, playing himself like a movie, writing himself like a novel. He isn’t used to saying these things. He tells Hunk, but Hunk knows what he’s talking about. Hunk knows Mamá’s favorite song, knows the posters on Julia’s walls, has seen Sofía’s baby pictures. 

All Keith knows are the little facts Lance gives to him, gift wrapped like he’s giving up a piece of himself every time.

Keith turns back, locks his eyes on Lance’s. The reminiscent residue of thinking about home is so out of place when he’s returning Keith’s violet stare, clashing wildly with the chill on his skin. 

(Home is warm. Space is cold.)

Keith doesn’t say anything, doesn’t push him. Lance watches his face until he’s sure of himself.

“Octavian and Julia are twins. They’re - they were fourteen when I left. I think Julia will have had her quinceñera by now. Julia had posters all over her half of the room, but Octavian’s side was always so neat. I don’t know how he did it.”

Keith cracks a smile. The sight of it makes Lance’s skin prickle. He looks - strange. Not  _ bad _ strange. It’s a lovely kind of strange. Lance doesn’t see Keith smile all too often.

“And Sofía was the youngest. We got her when she was only a few months old - Octavian and Julia and I were all older, when mamá and mami got us. And she loved to pull on my hair.” Unconsciously, he runs a hand between his locks, fingers digging in. Familiar gesture. He doesn’t do it much anymore, he notes, as he shifts his position so one leg dangles down.

“You love them a lot,” Keith states. No room for question.

“Of course.”

“Must be - ” he cuts himself off.  _ Must be nice _ , Lance knows.

It puts a sort of ache in him. It hurts, hurts so much to have something beautiful and then lose it, but he can’t imagine never having it at all. He would love them all over again even if it meant the pain that lives in him now, in the dead of night when he can’t sleep.

“You should come with me.” Lance says. He’s not sure why he said it. Maybe he’s so tired his brain is just running on its own. Likely story.

Keith’s eyes widen, and his jaw slackens a little, he’s so surprised. That’s kind of sad, too. That he’s astonished to receive the offer.

Lance clears his throat. “I mean it. You - deserve a family.”

Keith’s head tilts to the side, and he relaxes a little. “I have a family.” Pause. “The paladins are my family.”

He lets the words sink in - and it’s true. Pidge is his sister, and Hunk is his brother, and they don’t call Shiro  _ space dad _ for nothing. But still.

“Meet my family,” Lance tries again.

This time, Keith smiles again. He looks more content than Lance has seen him in so long. It’s almost a foreign look on him. “Okay.”

Lance nods. “Okay.”

The sound of the ship’s life support system is the only thing that’s running, now. It’s so familiar to him that he doesn’t even recognize it any more, of course. But he tunes it in, and strains his ears, and it’s -

So  _ loud _ .

“The whirring, right?” Keith asks.

Lance blinks. “How did you know?”

“It was never silent in the desert, at night,” he confides, almost with resignation, “but it was quieter than this. I miss it.”

“You? Miss the quiet?”

“What, you don’t believe me?”

Lance just shakes his head, lips quirking up. “How do you put up with me, then? I’m never quiet.”

He had meant it to be light, but the words come out loaded, somehow. Keith’s expression doesn’t change, though. He chooses his words carefully, Lance can tell. “You’re a curious person, Lance. And I know you like to act. You put on that mask for everybody, and you  _ know _ you don’t have to.”

Lance tries to cut in - “No, I - ”

Keith holds up a hand to shush his comments. “You’re going to deny it, but it’s not so hard to see, once I started paying attention. I just - why do you do it? We’re your family. You don’t have to do that.”

Lance presses his lips together. “I don’t know what you mean.”

“You know exactly what I mean.” It’s not malicious. Keith means what he says, and he says what he means. He’s that sort of person. 

(Must be nice, Lance thinks, to be able to be like that. He doesn’t know how.)

“It’s easier to just be whoever you want me to be,” Lance concedes, at last, “makes it simpler for all of us.”

Keith’s eyebrows draw together, in a sweetly confused expression. “Easier? No, no, no. Just be yourself.”

Lance ponders that, for a moment. Just be himself. Because it’s that simple, right?

“I don’t know how.”

“You - okay. Start with your favourite colour.”

Lance raises an eyebrow, and quirks his lips in a  _ look _ . “Blue.”

“Why?” Keith presses.

“Because - the ocean is blue. The sky is blue. My lion is blue.” Pause. “Everything I love is blue.”

Keith drops his shoulders. Lance hadn’t realized how tense he’d gotten. “There you go,” Keith says, satisfied, “wasn’t so hard.”

Lance scoffs. “You say that. I didn’t do anything different.”

“Were you lying?”

“Of course not.”

“Then it was real. All you have to do is be real.”

Lance doesn’t respond to that. What can he say?  _ I am real _ . Of course he’s real. Not being real is ridiculous. He doesn’t know what Keith’s talking about.

(He knows exactly what Keith’s talking about.)

Keith swings his legs off the side, and pushes himself off the ledge.

Lance’s gaze follows the lithe movement of his body involuntarily. “Where are you going?”

“Back to my room. Getting tired, I think.”

“You weren’t before?” Lance has a right to be slightly incredulous. They hadn’t fought that day, thank goodness. Their battles get closer and closer together, and it takes a toll every time, but they hadn’t fought that day. It didn’t stop Keith from training himself to his bones against the Altean sparring bot. Keith can’t have trained through level five and not be tired.

He lifts a shoulder in a half-shrug. “I knew you’d be out here.”

For the second time, Lance has no words.

He feels his eyes soften, the corners relaxing. He lets his head fall back against the cool metal. Familiar. “Family, huh?”

Keith holds out a hand, slowly. Hesitantly.

Lance takes it. Wraps his blanket tighter around himself, and takes one last look outside that window of his. He thought he’d been sneaky whenever he went to that window, but apparently not, if Keith found him. Keith’s, like, the least observant person he knows.

(Not true. He knows Keith’s scrutinizing gaze, has felt it enough times.)

Keith waits by Lance’s door until he wraps himself in a Lance-burrito with his blanket and drops into the bed. Still too small. Still too cold.

“Good night,” Keith says quietly, into the sterile stillness of Lance’s room.

The castle isn’t going to get any warmer. Not like home.

“Good night,” Lance says anyway. With the same tone as he did whenever he wished Sofía good night. With the same tone as he did whenever he wished Hunk good night. With the smile that he’s only ever really used around Keith, even though he doesn’t really know why.

The castle isn’t going to get any warmer, and home isn’t going to get any closer.

The longing isn’t going to get any better.

Lance falls asleep anyway, and he thinks as he drifts off, that really means something. He’s not quite sure what.

 

 

**keith (after)  
**

 

“There’s nothing  _ light _ about this situation,” Lance waves at the bare room, agitated, “and there never has been. I get that maybe you don’t have anyone back home, but I do, okay?”

Keith clenches his jaw. There’s something rising in his throat.

“I do.” Quieter. “My mami, mamá, abuelita, Octavian and Julia and Sofía. As far as I know, the Garrison has told them I’m MIA, and they might as well think I’m dead. Do you know how that feels?”

“Something like it.”

Lance tsks at that, something of a disbelieving furrow between his brows. “You know what it’s like to realize that the only people you ever loved - you can’t remember their faces? It’s been a year since I last told mamá I loved her. Does she - ” his voice cracks, and he slaps a hand over his mouth like it’ll conceal the sound, make him less vulnerable. “Does she even know, still?”

He sits down on his bed, hard, and turns to face the wall.

Keith feels like he shouldn’t be seeing this. This is Lance McClain, falling apart.

Voice deceptively calm, Keith says, “She knows.”

Lance shakes his head. His hand is still pressed to his mouth, and from where Keith’s standing it looks like Lance has made himself a makeshift muzzle.

“I should have said something to them before I left. What kind of son just  _ disappears _ ?”

“You didn’t know. You can’t blame yourself for that.” 

Lance, because he’s stubborn, just shakes his head again. Keith feels like maybe he should be slightly upset that Lance is refusing to listen to anything he has to say, but he kind of understands. After all, what does he know about family? About that kind of responsibility, that loyalty?

He doesn’t. Lance has said as much.

“I’m sorry I can’t help with that.” Keith hears his own voice almost through a filter, a thin wall. “Sorry I never knew what it was like to have a family.”

Lance opens his mouth to say something else, but Keith plows on.

“I only had one less reason not to die out there. And maybe I don’t have anyone back home - ” there’s something bitter in his voice,  _ obviously _ , as he echoes Lance, but he tries to suffocate that feeling, “ - but there’s already enough on my plate between worrying about you four idiots and whatever planet we happen to be saving.”

“You don’t understand,” Lance insists, still adamantly facing the wall. Keith tries to pretend it’s not awkward to talk to the back of his head. “It’s not the worrying. That’s not the point.”

Keith huffs. “Fine, I don’t understand. Maybe I’m just incapable of emotion - ”

“Stop. Stop with that. I - ” he pauses, and exhales, “That’s not what I meant. Please.”

Lance, changing the words that come out of his mouth long after he’s spat them out. Lance, crumpled in on himself like that, making it impossible to maintain any semblance of anger, of irritation.

Lance, pleading with him, and Keith doesn’t even know what he’s asking for. He stopped asking Keith for things a long time ago.

Lance doesn’t say anything else. The silence is punctured only by Lance’s breath, while he’s still trying to get it under control. 

Keith clenches his jaw. “What do you want me to say, then?”

“Nothing. I - ”

“Right. Okay. It’s fine. I won’t say anything.” Because he’s not expected to, so he won’t, because he can never think of the right thing to say, so he won’t. It’s just easier if he keeps his mouth shut. So he will.

“ _ No _ , God, that’s not it.” Lance turns back around, ever so slightly, shifting on the rumpled covers of his bed. “Let me ask you something.”

What could he possibly have to ask?

“Okay.”

“Did you ever have someone you - loved?”

Keith doesn’t answer right away. He’s not sure how to answer that. It’s a tall order, of a sort, because love is a big word to use.

He’s felt longing before. He’d longed to be a part of a family, to have someone who loves him, because it’s always easier to love someone who loves you.

But he doesn’t think he’s ever loved.

Honestly, he answers, throat hoarse, “No.”

Lance blinks at him. There’s a film of wetness over his eyes, and it looks about ready to spill over, but Lance is doing a mighty job of keeping it contained. “You’re sure?”

It’s the same voice Keith remembers from midnights at the Garrison, having snuck out of their rooms to the observatory or on the roof, hushed whispers because they’d been afraid of being caught, voices layered with young wanderlust.

He’d loved that, once. But like everything else, it had gone, too; is that really love? Can he call that love, if it broke him?

_ Nothing’s keeping you honest _ , some part of him says.  _ You can lie to his face. Say you never loved him _ .

But - that’s the thing. He can’t. Not to Lance.

“One,” Keith admits.

Lance swallows. Keith watches the movement of his throat, and trails his eyes back to Lance’s, and he looks like he’s contemplating something so hard, searching Keith’s face for anything else he can glean.

Keith knows how to hide what he’s feeling. It’s a long-established skill. He uses it.

“So you know,” Lance says at last, “that I have a chance. I  _ need  _ this. I have to try.”

Keith captures a lip between his teeth, pulling at it. He thinks he tastes blood, barely but there.

“I’m not  _ stupid _ \- I know exactly what I’m asking for. But it’s important to me. Doesn’t that count for something?” Lance is pleading now. Keith isn’t sure if he’s supposed to respond - he isn’t the one that Lance needs to convince.

He has a feeling that Lance isn’t talking to him, per se, but he’s talking  _ through _ him. He just has to… to say it. Keith’s just the face he’s using right now.

That’s not a new sentiment. And the fact that it isn’t, that’s slightly heartbreaking.

“Okay,” Keith says, after a pause. “I get it.”

“Really?”

Ha. “No. Not even a little. But that’s not your fault.”

Lance seems slightly taken aback that Keith would relinquish an opportunity to blame something on him. And sure, Keith is hotheaded, has a sizzling temper, has a nonexistent mind-to-mouth filter - but he knows when to stop. This is one of those moments that exists outside of Lance-and-Keith, that haphazard timeline of angry red lines and bruises visible or invisible. This is one of those peaceful things. Soft things. Keith will not ruin this one.

**Author's Note:**

> Thank you for reading! Lance is such a beautiful, deep character. Love me some Lance...
> 
> My [tumblr](its-nochillforov.tumblr.com), if anyone's interested?
> 
> Kudos are .....like water. Need.  
> Comments are ..like dessert? Amazing, and cherished.


End file.
